The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of WashingtonMedicine in Seattle are pleased to announce the arrival soon of Dr. Eric Holland, a world-class brain cancer research scientist and neurosurgeon, who will head up the Human Biology Division at Hutch as well as the Alvord Brain Tumor Center at UW. The eminent MD/PhD is being lured away from Manhattan's Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, where he directs the MSKCC brain tumor center and has his lab within the Cancer Biology and Genetics Program, where his team studies the molecular mechanisms underlying the development of central nervous system tumors. In addition to being the recipient of many prestigious awards over years, Holland brings with him over $3M a year in NIH/NCI funding. It's unclear how many of his 13 lab members will follow him across the country to take on new challenges at Hutch and UW.

When a catastrophic natural disaster strikes, first responders often make the difference between life and death for potential victims. Training, preparedness and valor play a part in successful rescue efforts, but so do good tools. Sometimes that tool is as basic as an axe or a flashlight, or a life vest or life raft. The recent mega-storm in the NE has us thinking about the kinds of tools that science research is coming up with to address emergency and crisis situations, both during and in the aftermath of a major event. To that end, we're taking a look back today at some of our earlier blogs on life science research invention to see what kinds of scientific solutions are on the horizon (or already here) to aid in disaster relief and recovery efforts.

It takes a long time for a lab science building to go from planning and fundraising, through permitting and construction and on to occupancy. In the case of the
University of Washington's
Molecular Engineering and Sciences Building, which is celebrating its
grand opening next week, that process took 5 years and had some unexpected perks. While there's been very little upside to the down economy since 2008, it has had the effect of lowering construction costs, which means that UW Seattle's newest science building is even bigger and better than they'd originally planned because they were able to get more for their
$77M.

One of the things they got was some very thoughtfully designed labs. Though flexibility of design is important to assure future utility, research team leaders gave significant input into the design of their specific labs to make sure those labs were ideal for the type of research that would be carried out within their walls. Project architect Tim Williams, of Zimmer Gunsul Frasca, said in an interview:

“Scientists spend a lot of time in the lab. The UW faculty wanted to look at how we could make that a nicer place to be."

Here are some of the ways they made a nicer science lab building:

5-story, 90,300sf structure

Each of the four above-ground floors is divided into a laboratory half and an office half

The basement is a 28,000sf low-vibration lab space

Houses more than 15 faculty, 3 research centers and 4 major instrumentation centers

Aluminum-plate shielding on the building guards against electromagnetic waves

Natural ventilation in office spaces provided by windows that open

Optimized ventilation in the lab spaces, replacing air 6 times per hour rather than 10

Innovative commons spaces

Green roof gardens

UW officials are proud of the new building, not just because it is state-of-the-art, but also because it's "state-of-the-science." Molecular engineering is a relatively new field, and the UW Molecular Engineering and Sciences Institute (MOLES, the building's primary occupant) sees its mission as exploring a new kind of engineering for the 21st Century: rather than build bridges over rivers (still a noble feat), the new molecular engineer may be building proteins that travel to specific parts of the body. He or she may follow the latest developments in chemistry, biology, physics, nanotechnology and predictive modeling; and his or her research projects will often be interdisciplinary, with colleagues from diverse fields and perhaps different institutions.

Furthermore, if life scientists often pursue basic research to understand the building blocks of life, and engineers build things and occupy themselves with practical mechanics and physical principles, the fusion of the two should have tremendous translational potential. Such is the goal of MOLES and their new collaborative workspace. Per their website:

Research at the Institute for Molecular Engineering & Sciences will be evolvable and dynamic, focusing initially on the themes of CleanTech and BioTech.

Some of the faculty scientists who will be doing research in the new MOLES facility include:

Biotechnology Calendar, Inc. will hold 3 professional tradeshow events focusing on Washington state's bioscience technology and the research partnerships between scientists and the science equipment industry next month on these dates:

For information on exhibiting at the University of Washington show in particular, and receiving a university research funding report, click here:

Biotechnology Calendar, Inc. is a full service event marketing and planning company producing on-campus, life science research tradeshows nationwide for the past 20 years. We plan and promote each event to bring the best products and services to the best research campuses across the country.

The University of Washington, Seattle recently received a $65 million grant from the NIH to help improve and streamline the UW Institute of Translational Health Sciences (ITHS) research program. This is the second grant of this type awarded to UW and will fund the program over a five year period.

The Washington-based Pacific Northwest Prostate Cancer SPORE (Specialized Programs of Research Excellence) is a cutting-edge life science consortium which includes several research centers throughout Washington State and British Columbia. The consortium focuses on the genetic mechanisms of prostate cancer to better develop effective treatments for the disease.

In 1962, the Seattle World's Fair was held in the northwestern capital city. The legacy of that event goes well beyond the iconic Seattle Space Needle (right) and is explored in a panoply of summer and fall educational and entertainment festivities celebrating the 50th Anniversary. One of the "Next50" happenings is an interactive exhibit to highlight the role of Washington State's life science research innovations in addressing global health challenges. If space exploration was the governing dream of the near future in the 1960's, our generation's overriding fascination may be with possibilties inherent in life science research discoveries and their applications for transforming the health of millions of people worldwide in order to lead fuller, longer lives.

You know there’s been a paradigm shift in the world when complicated biomolecular problems are solved by gamers, as in the recent, much-reported case of an AIDS protein solution worked out by Foldit players in a crowdsourcing research challenge posed by scientists at the University of Washington. In the longrun, the most significant part of this remarkable story may be the experiment itself and the implications it has for the way we think about work and play, and how that might influence the way we approach future research challenges. UW computer game scientists and biochemists developed the online game Foldit to see if non-scientist gamers could be taught enough science and engaged long enough to work out a scientific problem. And it turns out they can.

The NIH has just announced that the Electronic Medical Records and Genomics (eMERGE) consortium of seven US medical research institutions has received an additional $25M in funding for Phase II of a series of projects to study how genetic information in patients' medical records can be used to improve their care. As genome sequencing becomes increasingly affordable and more widely done, translational research is needed to show physicians how they might respond to indicators of genetic predisposition to disease in their treatment programs. The eMERGE network was formed in 2007 "to develop, disseminate, and apply approaches to research that combine DNA biorepositories with electronic medical record (EMR) systems for large-scale, high-throughput genetic research," according to the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) branch of the NIH.

The NSF has just announced funding for a new program to establish four Engineering Research Centers (ERCs) with over $70M in grants. One of the four universities chosen to participate in the program is the University of Washington, which will receive $18.5M over the next five years for its ERC for Sensorimotor Neural Engineering (ERC/SNE). Researchers will be designing and testing devices to restore or augment the body's capabilities for sensation and movement. UW's Neurobotics Lab will take a lead in the ERC/SNE, along with biologists and scientists focused on human health.